World at Your Fingertips (earth.google.com)

Member Name: MagdaDH

Product:	earth.google.com
Date:	15/06/09 (20 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: fascinating and informative

Disadvantages: requires a lot of processing power

Google Earth is, possibly, the most amazing piece of software I have encountered in the last 10 years: the wow factor is amazing and its capabilities beggar belief. It also happens to be very useful for many purposes.

I will not even attempt to write anything like a complete review/description of the package here, but instead I will tell you what I use or used it for. Please also note that new functionalities and changes to old ones are added all the time.

What is Google Earth?

Technically speaking, it's "a virtual globe program which maps the earth by the superimposition of images obtained from satellite imagery, aerial photography and GIS 3D globe".

Imagine seeing the Earth (there is also the sky view, and the Moon, but I will leave them for now) as a globe, floating (or rather hanging) in space. You can see the continents, the country borders, different colours of land, sea and ice. There are mouse controls that allow you to zoom in, travel in four directions and rotate the globe (the default has, obviously, North at the top).

As you zoom in, map features appear: more country borders, names of places, details of locations. As you zoom closer, you can see buildings (or rather their roofs), smaller landscape features and even cars parked in driveways (the detail available varies depending on location, and generally urban locations have much higher resolution than rural ones).

The sculpture of the terrain is simulated so when you change the angle of view you can see the mountains raising above the horizon. The map detail can be added so you can see street names and building numbers.

There are photos of every conceivable location and links to wikipedia (and multitude of other sources) entries.

Local information, from tourist attractions to hospitals and schools is available. In some places the 3D models of buildings are added so you can see the shapes not just roofs of Tokyo skyscrapers and London landmarks.

"Street View" allows you to literally enter panormaic photographs of locations (this is being slowly roleld out hroughout the globe, UK is not yet completely covered at the time of writing) and walk around neighbourhoods (all faces of people and numberplates of cars are blurred to preserve privacy).

Mind boggles and mouth opens in awe, as I said.

But Google Earth is much more than just a fancy globe with add-ons. It's also genuinely useful.

(1) It can be used in the same way Google Maps is used: to find locations (just type it in the search box and the program will fly you there), to find driving distances and directions and to locate businesses and organisations. All these basic functions are available from the first menu box on the left.

Now, to be perfectly honest I don't think there is much point in using Google Earth if all you want to do is find where 15 High Street is and how to get there from 28 Lower Station Road or to locate a pub near where you are staying on holiday. Google Maps does it just as well, and it takes much less resources (GE uses masses of processing power and you need a fair amount of CPU and RAM to operate it well and without crashing). Still, it's a very useful function when researching other subjects as a part of a bigger picture.

Plus, it saves your visited places during a session so you can come back to them easily and allows you to insert your own permanent placemarks for locations you are likely to want to use again and again. I stuck those placemarks in all places I have lived in the last 15 years or so just to remind myself!

(2) The additional layers of Google Earth combine with the main mapping layer to provide incredible amount of information literally at your fingertips. From road numbers to business addresses, weather info to places of interest, and, particularly useful for me, Street View photos; links to Wikipedia entries and Panoramio (a user provided, but Google-screened database of photos which are brilliant for anybody who is for example deciding on a holiday destination).

I used Google Earth and the Panoramio photos to research and choose final destinations for our last two holidays to places we have never visited before (western Ireland and Algarve in Portugal) and found it invaluable for that purpose. There is even a whole big section on weather, from hurricane warning systems to current temperature data.

(3) You can also download numerous user-generated overlays. I have been interested in wind farm developments, and found one that shows locations and data of all existing, being developed and planned wind farms in Scotland.

(4) On the main screen, Google Earth has several very useful tools, of which my favourite is the ruler: a simple mouse-operated tool which allows me to quickly measure distances as the crow flies, both in straight line and in path fashion. I have used it numerous times for all kinds of purposes, from getting a rough idea of how many thousand miles a planned trip accords Europe and Asia would cover to measuring a width of a particular road and an area of parks.

(5) While navigating the map with a mouse, you get precise information on latitude and longitude of every point (I used this function to determine the exact position of the middle point of the Old Trafford football ground!

You also get information on elevation, which, in combination with the ruler function, can be useful if you want to for example calculate the gradient of a particular hill or a road.


This is just a very quick overview of what Google Earth can provide. Depending on your particular needs, you might find yourself using it for all kinds of purposes. There is also a vibrant community of users that has grown around the Google Earth and provides all kinds of added content. If you haven't yet got hooked on Google Earth, Do! Download it, use it, play with it and you are sure to enjoy it!

The biggest disadvantage is that you need quite a bit of processing power and RAM (and - obvioulsy- pretty fast broadband connection) to operate the program.

Summary: ultimate in exploration software